Neural Networks Learn to Draw

Specialists of Google Lab explained how they received artificially created surrealistic images.

Software engineers from Google published the results of an experiment on training artificial neural networks to create images. One of the main characteristics of the neural networks is their ability to learn, in other words, to become smarter with every task solved.

Special neural networks which were designed for object recognition were used for the research. First, the program analyzed lines, shapes and colors, and then compared the characteristics with data uploaded to their memory to produce an answer, for example: “picture features a crane.”

To train the networks to create their own images, scientists forced them to work in a different way. They uploaded images with a random noise and specified the object, for example “a banana,” and ordered the network to improve the image. The program was able to identify some features of the fruit and to create an image with banana pattern. Then, the scientists created a more complicated task to improve the image. As a result they received surreal looking images. Now, if the program is given a task to improve photos or paintings, it will create abstract or surreal elements based on its own judgment.